Disneyland!

I'm here with 29 pictures so I won't waste too much time on words. I will just say that Abigail threw up 20mins into the drive, then again a couple of hours later. She was not really herself the whole first day (and you can see it in the photos) but she was a little trooper and was NOT going to leave that park come hell or high water. OR take the glitter Minnie Mouse ears off ;)



ready for the park - that plastic bag attached to the stroller is the throw-up clothes!

poor kid - she was on outfit number 3 by this point!

Bryony spent a lot of the trip anxious and climbing up me, little too young for rides

what she bought with Grandad's $15 souvenir money

Bryoy LOVED Minnie, except up-close :)



hotel rooms are just as exciting as rides to kids

Bryony got a Minnie Mouse with her $15 souvenir money and spent the whole day shouting "MIMI"with excitement every time she saw him/her. Her favourite part of the trip was this cardboard cut-out, ha. She is now very attached to her Mimi, and, along with Abigail being sick, this is my biggest memory of our trip. Bryony will forever love Mickey & Minnie Mouse!

Dancing

I really hope this video works:

Hand-Writing

Abigail's note to her sister:

I was so proud to tell her that I didn't need her to read it to me since I could read it myself!

Madonna Family Tree

Through the power of Facebook, and finding relatives you would never have found otherwise, Grandma has dug up some amazing stories from years past in her family tree. Complete with pictures!

Antonio Madonna, Grandma's Uncle otherwise known as Uncle Peanuts

Caroline Madonna, Grandma's aunt

Eve Madonna, Grandma's aunt

sorry, Grandma, I got lost among all the stories and can't figure out who Jessie is?

Richard Madonna - again, I need help, Grandma!

Uncle Winner - again, lost :(

So, clearly, I need some help deciphering all the fascinating emails back and forth between Grandma and her long-lost relatives. One of them mentioned a real Family Tree 'List' - if we get our hands on a copy of that, I'll come back and update this post.

Lil' Sister

Summer Days

Remember, summer is April here.

Dolls

Abigail has been playing with these dolls today. She had them lined up ready to go to a Ball. I couldn't help but notice that the two on the left must be the wild princesses, no?! ;)

Up In The Air

Just watched this movie. Oh, how I wanted to like it. I love the premise, but it just wasn't really believable. The characters were two-dimensional and the idea that a 'firing industry 'is that big, or that ruthless, just wasn't believable. So I'll give 2.5 out of 5. I mean, I did get to watch George Clooney for two uninterrupted hours ;)

Zumba

I spent this evening at a Zumba class. If you know me at all, you are shocked. Because you know that the closest I've come to exercise in the past 20yrs has been to stir my own coffee in the mornings. Turns out that it's not really that I'm unfit but actually that I'm uncoordinated. Zumba was a little challenging for a 100% English girl without a Latin bone in her body. But I went. I exercised. And for that, I should get today's gold star.

Easter 2012

We are usually in California for Easter but this year we had to stay home because we couldn't get the days off. So, we had an early morning Easter Egg Hunt in our backyard and the traditional meal of ham, green beans and scalloped potatoes that afternoon with my parents and their friends. Here are the (few) pictures:

Because they'd been playing with plastic eggs all week long at school, Bryony knew to immediately bust them open. There was no telling this baby to neatly collect them in a pretty basket, then bring them indoors at the end to check them out. No, she knew they had goodies inside and didn't waste a second. First one, chocolate: